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LAWRENCE — University of Kansas professor emeritus Ted Johnson, humanities and Western civilization, will conduct his annual Stop Day walking tour of various iconic buildings and sites along the Lawrence campus on Friday, May 10.

The tour runs from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., and attendees are welcome to come and go as they please. Consisting of informal, peripatetic, Socratic dialogues growing out of various sites, it will start in front of the Natural History Museum or, in the case of inclement weather, in the portico of Lippincott Hall.

The program is as follows:

9 a.m. “Whoso findeth wisdom findeth life.” Location: Natural History Museum, 14th and Jayhawk Boulevard. An inquiry into the interrelations of the Romanesque Revival architecture and iconography of Spooner Hall and the Museum of Natural History.

10 a.m. The Seven Liberal Arts and the Classical Tradition. Location: Lippincott Hall. The interrelations of the Daniel Chester French statue group, the Ionic portico of Lippincott Hall, law and the seven liberal arts.

11 a.m. “Make our garden grow” (final chorus of Leonard Bernstein’s “Candide”). Location: Twente Hall and then to the Prairie Acre. An inquiry into the implications of the quotation from Plato’s “Republic” just inside the door — “Our youth will dwell in a land of health and fair sights and sounds”—and the campus as garden with the Prairie Acre and sculptures representing a “Prairie Formation,” “The Pioneer,” “St. George and the Dragon” and “Mercury.”

Noon: Memory, the Muses, and the Liberal Arts and Sciences. Location: Watson Library, then across campus to Burge Union: An inquiry into the implications of the College Gothic northern façade of the University Library; the Romanesque Revival eastern façade of Stauffer-Flint; late Brutalism and the humanities building; the glass pyramid of the science library; the military science building and the 1943 wall, Murphy Hall and the arts, then on to the Burge Union.

2 p.m. “Civilization is measured by the extent to which people obey unenforceable laws.” Location: The Law School. “Tai Chi Figure I” by Ju Ming, “The Spirit of Laws” by Stephen Johnson, the I-beam sculpture at the engineering building, the foundry in the fine arts building, and the student-designed memorial at the School of Architecture, Design and Planning.

3. p.m. “Of cycles and civilizations: the Chi Omega Fountain and the University of Kansas Korea and Vietnam War Memorials.” Location: Chi Omega Fountain. Location: The Chi Omega Fountain and Memorial Drive. An inquiry into the implications of the iconography of the fountain and the story of Persephone, Demeter and Hades, beginning with pomegranates and then turning around the cycles of life, death, wheat, seasons, courage, honor, sacrifice and wisdom.

4 p.m. The World War II Memorial Carillon and Campanile and the northern slopes of Mount Oread. Location: The Memorial Campanile. After reflections on the memorials on the northern slopes of Mount Oread, a descent through the shadows and raking light of Marvin Grove and then a gradual return up to the plane of Mount Oread.

5 p.m. Tentative Syntheses and Perspectives. Location: Arthur D. Weaver Court, adjacent to Spooner Hall: Having come full circle, a summing up of the day’s dialogues in a garden where, formerly, under the dappled shade of graceful trees arching over the merry splashing of a fountain, floated a quartet of large rocks.

For further information, please contact the Department of Humanities and Western Civilization at hwc@ku.edu or Johnson at jtj@ku.edu.

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